Hungarian radio station praises attack on Jewish leader

(JTA) — A Hungarian nationalist online radio station called the recent assault on a Jewish community leader in Budapest a “response to general Jewish terrorism.”

“Predictably and unfortunately, the good attackers were captured very quickly,” the news edition of Szent Korona Radio, or Holy Crown Radio, reported.

The report was about the arrest of two men, 20 and 21, last Friday on suspicion that they physically and verbally assaulted the 62-year-old president of the Jewish congregation of the Hungarian capital’s South Pest district.

Founded in 2006, Szent Korona Radio broadcasts talk shows and music in Hungarian over the Internet.

The website of the Hungarian police said the victim, Andras Kerenyi, was attacked near Budapest’s Teglagyar Square because of his religion and that his injuries did not require medical treatment. The two men are being held as indictments against them are being drawn up, the report said.

Gusztav Zoltai, executive director of the Federation of Hungarian Jewish Communities, told the Hungarian news agency MTI that Kerenyi was kicked in his stomach as the assailants shouted obscenities at him and told him he was going to die.

The police report said that after the attack, Kerenyi followed the suspects and at the same time reported the incident to police. A police patrol arrested the men 32 minutes after the attack at a nearby house. The report named the suspects as Mark F. and Tibor P.

In June, Jozsef Schweitzer, a retired Hungarian chief rabbi, was accosted on a Budapest street by a man who told him he “hates all Jews.”